HIS HEAVENLY SMILE: New York Archbishop Timothy Dolan is set to join an exclusive club today with his promotion to the College of Cardinals, along with 21 other men, at a ceremony presided over by Pope Benedict XVI at St. Peter’s Basilica in Rome.Reuters

REFLECTION: Archbishop Timothy Dolan (left) prays with Pope Benedict XVI and members of the College of Cardinals yesterday before addressing the august body ahead of his own elevation to cardinal. (Reuters)

ROME — Good morning, Your Eminence.

New York Archbishop Timothy Dolan was named cardinal by Pope Benedict XVI today, receiving a red hat and ring during an elevation ceremony at St. Peter’s Basilica before 10,000 people.

Dolan could be seen smiling during the ceremony.

“For me, this is more than a promotion,” Dolan told The Post yesterday. “It’s a calling to help others. It is also a tremendous honor for New York.”

As a result of being made a cardinal along with 21 other men, Dolan will be handed a series of responsibilities, including an eligibility to take part in a conclave that elects a new pope.

As of today’s ceremony, Dolan, 62, will be one of 125 cardinals who would be responsible for electing a new pontiff.

“That will be my biggest job,” he admitted.

Dolan’s predecessor as archbishop, Edward Cardinal Egan, said all of New York will be pulling for the city’s newest cardinal.

“He has a big job ahead of him,” Egan said. “We are all here behind him.”

As a newly minted prince of the church, Dolan joins an elite group of men who serve as close advisers to the pope.

“Dolan is the Vatican’s go-to guy on any issue affecting the church in the English-speaking world,” said Vatican observer John Allen. “At the moment, he is a rock star within the church.”

For the next six weeks, New York will have the distinction of having two potential papal electors — Egan and Dolan.

Egan turns 80 on April 2 and will no longer be eligible to vote in a conclave after that date.

Dolan spent last night having dinner with his family, including his 84-year-old mother, Shirley, and went to bed early in preparation for the big day.

The consistory ceremony was the culmination of a week during which Dolan was seen all around Rome, touring the sights and eating at restaurants.

He greeted pilgrims at almost every stop. (Nearly 800 New Yorkers have flown to the Vatican to witness today’s historic event.)

And he celebrated Mass at several of Rome’s most famous basilicas, including St. John Lateran and St. Mary Major.

One of the highlights of Dolan’s trip came yesterday morning at the Vatican when he delivered the keynote address for the pope and his soon-to-be colleagues in the College of Cardinals.

Calling New York “a very religious city,” Dolan defended it against the stereotype of being an immoral place — a modern-day Sodom and Gomorrah — and even sprinkled his speech with his trademark good humor.

Dolan, who spoke on the “new evangelization” aimed at Catholics who have strayed in recent decades, said New York may be known for a lot of immoral things, but that people in the city are welcoming of faith and religion.

“There one finds, even among groups usually identified as materialistic — the media, entertainment, business, politics, artists, writers — an undeniable openness to the divine,” Dolan said in the speech, which he delivered entirely in Italian.

With Egan and 100 other cardinals in attendance inside the Paul VI Hall, Dolan noted that he had been invited by the Holy See to give the address after church officials had hinted “that my home archdiocese of New York might be the ‘capital of a secular culture.’ ”

“New York — without denying its dramatic evidence of graphic secularism — is also a very religious city,” Dolan proclaimed.

Dolan and the others joined the pope for a day of meetings, prayer and reflection before today’s ceremony.

During his speech, Dolan called on the church to use a “creative strategy” to bring lapsed Roman Catholics back into the fold.

“The new evangelization is accomplished with a smile — not a frown,” he insisted.

Apologizing at one point for his poor Italian, Dolan did make them smile with a joke. He said that going out and spreading the word of God in today’s world required cardinals to live and spread the faith with love, joy and “sorry to bring it up — but blood.”

Dolan pointed out that cardinals wear deep-red clothing as a symbol that they’re prepared to shed blood for their faith after pledging an oath during their elevation ceremony that they should be prepared to die as martyrs.

“Holy Father, can you omit the ‘shedding of your blood’ when you present me with the red hat?” Dolan asked the pope.

Dolan then called the cardinals “scarlet audio-visual aids” for all men and women “who are also called to be ready to suffer and die for Jesus.”

Excerpts of Cardinal-designate Timothy Dolan’s address yesterday to Pope Benedict XVI and members of the College of Cardinals:

“His Eminence, the secretary of state, asked me to put it into the context of secularism, hinting that my home archdiocese of New York might be the “capital of a secular culture.” As I trust my friend and new brother cardinal Edwin O’Brien — who grew up in New York — will agree, New York — without denying its dramatic evidence of graphic secularism — is also a very religious city. There one finds, even among groups usually identified as materialistic — the media, entertainment, business, politics, artists, writers — an undeniable openness to the divine!”

“When I became archbishop of New York, a priest told me, “You better stop smiling when you walk the streets of Manhattan or you’ll be arrested!”

“In New York, the heart of the most hardened secularist softens when visiting one of our inner-city Catholic schools. When one of our benefactors, who described himself as an agnostic, asked Sister Michelle why, at her age, with painful arthritic knees, she continued to serve at one of these struggling but excellent poor schools, she answered, “Because God loves me, and I love Him, and I want these children to discover this love.”

“Thank you, Holy Father and brethren, for your patience with my primitive Italian. When Cardinal Bertone asked me to give this address in Italian, I worried, because I speak Italian like a child.”

“And maybe that’s a fitting place to conclude: We need to speak again as a child the eternal truth, beauty and simplicity of Jesus and His church. Sia lodato Gesu Cristo! (Praise be to Jesus Christ!)”